


This is how you get a cat.

by inkpot (myexplodingcat)



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M, Slytherpuff, Tumblr Ask Box Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-28
Updated: 2020-05-28
Packaged: 2021-03-02 23:19:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 5,651
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24414991
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/myexplodingcat/pseuds/inkpot
Summary: Seb is a high-performing fifth-year Slytherin student. He's more stressed out than he wants to let on, but soon he gets adopted by an unusually intelligent cat who seems to think she's his emotional support animal. But is the creature really just a cat?This fic was requested anonymously on Tumblr.
Kudos: 14





	1. Sneaky Paws

It hadn't been this bad before.

It was hubris, that was the problem. But he'd gotten this far, and he wasn't about to give up now. Seb had maintained his class load--the maximum number of classes it was physically possible to take, in fact, at least without altering time--until fifth year. There was no way he'd quit any of them in the final year of OWL classes, just because every teacher in the school was cracking down on their studies in preparation.

School wasn't the only thing on his mind, he had to admit. His parents were sort-of-not-really arguing with him about his career choice. His ambitions looked very different from his parents' expectations (they wanted him to aim for a stable, lucrative, prestigious job that would let him maintain the family home after he inherited), and the shocked, stern response he'd gotten after hinting at his real plans at the end of the summer hadn't left his mind. His parents' letters had been shorter than usual lately, and had very carefully avoided the current touchy subject entirely; they were Not Talking About It.

Seb liked to think he didn't care--that he'd do what he wanted with or without their approval--but his relationship with his family was important to him, and he couldn't bring himself to tell them that the last thing he wanted was to be tied down to a giant house in Britain. He wanted to travel, to teach at wizarding schools in different countries, to learn languages and write books about different wizarding cultures. He loved the idea of having friends and contacts in India and Brazil, of being known and respected by scholars around the world. But in his parents' eyes, neither "teacher" nor "writer" (and certainly not "nomad") sounded like anything they'd been envisioning for him... and he was an only child, so there wasn't even a sibling who could take care of their home instead. 

That was in the back of Seb's mind almost constantly, that his family's relationship with him was currently unsteady. This was the first time he'd disagreed with them about something so important, and it nagged at him even as he tried to focus on classwork.

His teachers had noticed his fatigue. Professor McGonnagall had started asking after his health. Professor Sophos, the Potions teacher, had taken to popping out into the hallway just in time to offer him a cup of tea every time he passed her office, with the reliability of a fully-wound Jack-in-the-box, so he'd changed his route back from class as not to pass by. He especially didn't want to talk to her, because although she wasn't the strictest teacher, he suspected she was figuring out that he'd been using Wideye potions to stay awake and study. That wasn't what they were supposed to be used for, but they worked.

Seb stretched out over the top of his desk, his Transfiguration homework crinkling beneath him. He dropped his forehead onto the desk between his arms with a dull thunk. A few of his classmates looked up.

"Seb?" His friend Julian was shaking his shoulder. "Hey, are you doing okay?"

Seb fixed his face into the best friendly/neutral expression he could before lifting his head. "Yeah, I'm fine. I've just been writing so long I can't get my eyes to focus, haha."

"Oh. I was gonna say, I've finished that one so I could help you if you need it, but maybe you should take a nap instead?" Julian frowned at him. "You've been staying out here late every night. Don't think I don't notice."

"It's just the number of classes I have, it takes longer to finish everything. Don't worry about it."

"I'm gonna drop sleeping potion in your pumpkin juice and drag your stupid butt back down to bed one of these days."

"You're not strong enough to carry me, dorkwad."

"Feather light charm, dingbat."

"All right, fine, I'm taking a break. I'm gonna go steal food from the kitchens."

"Sounds like a plan."

Seb got up and made his way around the room, weaving through leather armchairs and trying not to stub his toes on the marble statues that littered the Slytherin common room as thoroughly as lawn gnomes in an old lady's garden. Clumsy from lack of sleep, he nevertheless managed to make it out of their dungeon without calling more attention to himself. The last thing he wanted was for his classmates to think he couldn't hack it.

Whatever he said to Julian, Seb really wasn't in the mood to eat. He'd just wanted to escape questioning by leaving. So he wandered around the dungeons' secret passageways for a while--the ones no one really used, since they were in inconvenient places--until he found one that was appropriately dark and secluded, where he could hear the approach of anyone coming.

He sat down on the floor, against the wall, and stared at his knees. His brain seemed to have stopped working. This was when he'd normally take a dose of Wideye potion, but of course, that was in the bottom of his trunk, the bottle hidden under a pile of his old underpants.

His dissociation only broke when one of the castle cats tried to climb into his lap.

"Oh," he said, and adjusted his position to accommodate it. It purred, stepping up onto his legs in that sort of uncomfortable way cats have, and smacked him in the face with its raised, happy tail. "Why are you wet? ...Oh," he said again, realizing that the cat had in fact just smeared Seb's own tears across his face. He hadn't realized he'd been crying.

It was looking at him oddly. He cleared his throat. "You know," he said, "I don't recognize you. A ginger and white longhair... you don't belong to any of the Slytherins, and most of the other cats don't come down here. Huh. Did someone get a new cat?"

It responded by putting its front paws on his chest and headbutting him in the face. He spluttered, trying to spit out cat hair, and scratched the creature behind its ears to stop it from getting more fur in his face. Finally, it curled up in his lap.

"Heh. You're funny," he told it. "What are you doing in this part of the dungeons, anyway? There's nothing down this way except broom closets and supply rooms. Were you chasing a mouse?"

It just twisted to roll halfway over, its front paws sticking in the air as it rubbed its ears on his knee.

Seb sat there with the cat for another twenty minutes before it abruptly got up and walked to the end of the secret passage. It turned around, as if waiting for him. "Hey, where are you going?"

The cat just stood there. "All right," he said, "I'm coming." He got up, wiped his face on his sleeve (which was now regrettably covered in cat fur) and followed it.

The cat didn't stop to let him pick it up again. It led him back through the dungeons and up a flight of stairs, towards the kitchens.

"You want me to get you something to eat?" he asked it. "Well, aren't you lazy! But all right." He tickled the pear in the painting and snuck into the kitchens.

Seb returned a few minutes later, with a little bit of canned tuna on a saucer, and a couple of pasties for himself--he actually was hungry, now. The cat purred loudly, rubbing up against his legs.

They ate together. Seb watched as the little creature licked the dish clean. Then it sat back and started to wash its face with its paw. The dish vanished back into the kitchen, as Hogwarts dishes tended to when cleared. Then the cat trotted off again, stopping at the end of the hall and waiting for him.

This time it led him back to the Slytherin common room. It weaved around his feet until he gave it one more scritch behind the ears and told it good night.

"Huh," Julian said as Seb threw himself into his favorite armchair, still munching on half a pasty. "You actually did go to get something to eat. I thought for sure you were just trying to get rid of me."

"What?" Seb put on an innocent expression. "You think I'd lie to you?"

"Well, not successfully," Julian said, cleaning under his fingernails with his pocketknife. "Besides, you were gone for ages."

"I got distracted by a really affectionate cat."

Julian sighed. "What, was the store all out of good excuses?"

Seb snorted.

"Look," Julian said, "I just hope you're not... doing something stupid. You tend to overwork yourself, that's all. Don't burn out."

"You're such a mom friend," Seb said, waving his chunk of pasty around.

"I'm serious."

"Yes, I understand," Seb said in a mock solemn voice. "I will make great study of the way of the guava monks."

Julian snorted at the in-joke. "All right, I'll get off your case. But get some rest soon, okay?" He got up to go to bed.

"Yeah. Night."

As soon as Julian left, Seb got up and went back to his essay. This time, though, his eyes didn't swim through the words uncomprehendingly. He finished the rest in twenty minutes. He felt exhausted, but... more grounded somehow. Maybe it was the food. He rolled up his essay and went to bed.


	2. Fluffy Intel

Seb kept an eye out for the cat all day, curious where it came from, but it was nowhere to be found. Maybe its owner kept it in their House common room during the daytime? But cats had a way of getting in and out when they wanted to. Maybe it just liked to nap somewhere private.

Tonight, he decided to tackle his studies in the library rather than the common room, to avoid questioning. He passed table of seven or eight Hufflepuffs, several of whom looked up at him as he went by and then tried to pretend they hadn't. But, as a fifth-year Slytherin, Seb was used to this attitude from the rest of the school. Slytherins had each other and soon stopped worrying about what the other Houses thought of them.

He worked late into the evening. The Hufflepuffs, chattering, rolled up their finished homework and left the library. Seb was on his fourth piece of homework and had three more to go; he wondered what time it was, and if the librarian would shoo him out soon. Glancing around discreetly to make sure she wasn't around, he pulled his bottle of Wideye from his bag.

He almost dropped it again when he saw movement in his peripheral vision. But it was the cat again, not the librarian.

"Oh, it's you," he said, relieved. It hopped into his lap and curled up, wrapping its long, fluffy tail around itself. It opened one eye to glare at him as he took the potion, as if it knew what he was doing and disapproved, but it snuggled in anyway.

Seb kept writing for another hour, until the cat's head perked up. It hopped off his lap, trotted off into the stacks, and then ran back. It leapt onto the table.

"What is it?"

The cat looked toward the aisle. Seb listened hard: now he could hear the telltale muttering of Madam Pince, trying to clear out the library. She was known for giving unpleasant amounts of scolding to those who tried to stay in the library after curfew. Seb was already packing his bag.

The cat dropped off the other side of the table and sat by the other end of the aisle. Once again, Seb followed. It led him to a short spiral staircase he'd never noticed before in the vastness of the library. He and the cat hid behind a couch until Madam Pince left.

"You know, you're very smart," Seb said to the cat, a little suspicious. "Are you part Kneazle or something?"

It blinked at him.

"Well... thanks."

The cat nuzzled its head into his hand and purred.

* * *

Sometimes the Great Hall was too loud. Seb had a headache from missing sleep. Julian was still at Quidditch practice, though, and wasn't around to scold Seb for sneaking away with a pile of food.

Seb knew all the weird little spots in the castle no one used, where he could go to sit and read the muggle comics his parents hated, or to just not be around people. This time, he chose an out-of-the-way classroom on the fifth floor that was mainly used for storage. No one should be able to find him here.

He was halfway through his meal when he saw the cat. The cat! The cat again! What, did it have a tracking charm on him--

Huh. There was a thought.

Perfectly benign, however, the cat merely sat next to him, a fuzzy loaf pressed up against his leg as he sat on the floor. He fed it scraps from his lunch. When he was finished, it climbed into his lap and purred until his headache stopped.

"Who do you belong to?" he asked. "I've never seen you with one of the other students."

It stared at him.

"You belong to yourself, is that it?"

The cat nuzzled into his hand again.

Seb laughed. "What, is this how you get a cat? You've decided you belong to me now?"

Loud purrs for that.

"...Okay then."


	3. Fuzz Therapist

By the time evening rolled around, Seb had something extra in his bag.

He'd once again chosen an area outside the Slytherin common room to work in. Disused classrooms were less comfortable, but also less noisy, and going through his afternoon classes had brought his headache back. So after dinner, rather than heading for the dorms, he found his way to one of the Herbology sheds. It was always unlocked; there wasn't anything dangerous or valuable in here, just a workbench and plenty of potting soil and gardening tools. Seb found the location appropriate, given that he was doing the readings for Herbology tonight.

Of course, the cat showed up. Was it tracking his scent? That seemed like a cat thing to do, right?

"I have a gift for you," he said, after it leapt into his lap. He reached for his bag.

The cat didn't resist as he tied the soft green ribbon around its neck. "So pretty," he told it, ruffling its fur. "You know, I'd give you a name, but I get the feeling that you already have one. I don't suppose you'd tell me."

To his surprise, it hopped off his lap and left. It returned in a few minutes with a leaf in its mouth. Seb took it.

"Your name is Leaf?" he guessed.

The cat stared at him. Seb flipped through his Herbology book a bit. The leaf looked like it came from a hazel tree.

"Hazelnut?" he tried. Yes, that sounded like a name for a ginger cat with warm brown eyes.

The cat blinked at him.

"Did I get it?" Then it struck him how odd this communication was. "That was a complicated thing you just did, wasn't it? I'm starting to think you are part Kneazle. No, don't give me that innocent look, I know better."

But the cat merely curled up on the bench next to him. In fact, it fell asleep with its belly up, tail flicking at whatever it--well, she, Seb could tell now that she was in this less than dignified position--was dreaming about.

He found it hard to concentrate on his reading that evening. He was too tired. Apparently Hazelnut sensed this, because she hopped up on the table and laid down on his book. Seb knew this was pretty normal cat behavior, but Hazelnut had already demonstrated that she wasn't exactly normal. She was telling him to stop.

"All right, fair enough," he told her. He brushed the fur off the pages and put the book back in his bag. 

But rather than leading him back to the kitchens or dorms, Hazelnut sat on the table and stared at him, as if she were giving him an intervention.

"Look," he said, without really understanding why, "it's not just school stuff, okay? I can handle that. It's this other thing..." And he found himself explaining the whole story to her, about his parents, his classwork, his worries about not wanting his classmates to see how much stress he was under. This time, he noticed when he started crying, because his voice shook, but he carried on anyway. It was silly, but when he'd finished, he felt better.

She headbutted him in the face. Then, without warning, she climbed onto his shoulders, wrapping herself snugly around his neck. She was like a scarf, if scarves periodically hit you in the face with a fluffy tail. Her weight felt oddly reassuring.

Seb wiped his face and got up, collecting his bag. Hazelnut didn't seem bothered by the movement, and stayed resolutely on his shoulders. She looked around regally as he carried her back into the castle and down to the Slytherin dorms.

"Who's that?" Julian asked, laughing, as Seb came in. "Did you steal one of the Gryffindors' scarves and use it for Transfiguration practice? Or is that the super affectionate cat that distracted you for an entire hour the other day?"

"This is Hazelnut," Seb said. "She's adopted me."

Julian snorted. "Cute. I didn't take you for a cat person."

Seb would have shrugged, but this movement was more difficult at the moment.

"You sure she's not a spy from one of the other Houses?" Julian asked, grinning. "Maybe there's a Gryffindor somewhere who's sending her to keep an eye on us. WhooOOOooo!"

"You're a dweeb."

"I'm not the one wearing a living orange feather boa."


	4. Hazelnut's Gift

Seb actually got enough sleep that night, for once, and woke up around dawn to watch Julian's second bout of weekend Quidditch practice. Hazelnut didn't magically find him this time, which was a real shame, since she was warm and the Quidditch pitch was starting to feel chilly with the approaching winter. But she did turn up just in time to slip into the common room when they came back, and snuggle up to Seb while he and Julian traded chocolate frog cards.

"That fourth save was something else," Seb was saying.

"Gerald puts a spin on his goal throws, so they slip out of your hands if you're not careful," Julian explained. "That's how we got the edge on Ravenclaw last time. You can catch it again and re-shoot before the Keeper has time to recover."

"I saw that, but I didn't realize it was on purpose."

"Yeah. It embarrasses the bristles out of their brooms too." He surveyed his card collection. "I'm still missing a Gregorovitch."

"Sorry, I don't have him either. Bathilda Bagshot?"

"You're missing her? I've got three of her. Trade you for... a Dawlish?" Julian suggested.

"Done. They have a Florean Fortescue card now, did you hear? Turns out they just recently figured out he was smuggling supplies to Dumbledore's lot during the war. That's why he was killed."

"Oh, wow. No, I haven't run into any of those yet."

"I liked him. Wish I could find one."

Hazelnut's ears twitched. Seb reached over and gave her scritches. She twisted over contentedly, grabbing his hand with her paws to keep his attention.

Julian shook his head. "That cat is so extra. Where'd you find her, anyway?"

"Just wandering around. I think she's part Kneazle. She's really smart."

"Aren't Kneazle hybrids usually bigger than that? My uncle keeps them."

"I don't know. I guess it depends what kind of cat you breed them with, right?"

"That'd make sense, I suppose."

Hazelnut finally released Seb. She got up and trotted over to the door out of the common room.

"Oh, you want to go hunting?" Seb asked. "Here. I'll let you out."

"Cat butler," Julian said as Seb returned.

Seb held up an arm as if carrying a tea towel, and bowed.

That night, Seb flopped into bed and slid his hands under his pillow to press it firmly into his face, when he felt something under the pillow. He pulled it out. The light was already dim, but it looked suspiciously like a chocolate frog card.

He pulled the covers over his head. "Lumos."

Florian Fortescue--and, clinging to the plastic still on the card, several long ginger cat hairs.


	5. Tracking and Trapped

It was between classes. Seb was becoming more and more interested in the mystery of where Hazelnut went all day. Or all night, for that matter. She wasn't interested in sleeping in the Slytherin dorms, even though the other Slytherin cats hardly left the place. It was time to try his tracking spell.

The green ribbon he'd given Hazelnut should, in theory, allow him to track her down. He hadn't tried it yet.

"Sequorus," he said, and his wand point lit up. He hid it in the pocket of his robes, to avoid attention, but checked on it frequently.

It was a game of hot and cold, basically. His wand glowed brighter as he got closer to his target; if he took a wrong turn, it started glowing red. But his trail ended in a classroom. Seb wasn't going to interrupt a class to look for his cat.

He wasn't surprised, though. The castle cats went pretty much wherever they wanted, and any classroom with a warm fireplace was free real estate as far as they were concerned--especially now that the weather was getting colder.

Seb would just have to try again later and hope he could catch her somewhere else. Unfortunately, he didn't have much spare time to try and track her down. 

Finally, he got another chance. Down from the astronomy tower. Past the Great Hall. Down one flight of stairs into the dungeons... two... three, no, that made it turn red... back upstairs and down a corridor. Seb was so focused on his tracking spell that he didn't notice where he actually was. This was less than ideal, since he happened to be walking right past Professor Sophos's office.

"Mr. Marchbanks," she greeted him warmly. "How nice to see you! What brings you here at this time of day?"

Seb, startled by her sudden appearance but trying not to let this on, smiled back. "Hello, Professor." He didn't really want to explain the real reason he'd been wandering around, so instead he said, "I was just meaning to ask you about last week's third potion. I've been trying to reproduce it for practice, but I think I'm getting something wrong."

"Applying yourself to your studies as always, aren't you, Marchbanks? Well done. But there can be too much of a good thing, you know. Come in, I'll answer your questions, of course..."

At that point, he had no choice but to follow.

Seb carried his false pretenses out for a while, but something in Professor Sophos's face made it clear that she wasn't entirely buying the story. She answered every question he asked, but with an air of waiting for him to get on with it. She obviously knew that the longer she held him there, the less likely he'd be able to keep up the lie.

Seb knew this, too. "Thank you, Professor," he said, standing up. "That's helped a lot."

"I'm sure it has, but sit down, dear. You look exhausted."

Seb couldn't think of a reason to protest. He'd finished with classes for the day, and dinner wasn't for another two hours.

His professor was pouring tea. "I've noticed your attention in class hasn't been as focused lately. Is there anything wrong?"

"No, Professor."

She gave him a look that said she wasn't having this, and handed him a mug. "You haven't been sleeping properly. I'm a mom. I can tell."

"I'm studying for the OWLs," he tried.

"I'd believe that was it, if you weren't so smart," she said.

"I'm taking a lot of classes."

"As you have done for two and a half years now," she said, nodding. "What else?"

Seb hesitated.

"Is there a girl?" Professor Sophos smiled.

"What?"

Seb's look of genuine surprise seemed to derail her. "Never mind, never mind," she said, still smiling. "I was hoping it was that. But no, it's something else. Something going on at home?" She looked over the top of her mug at him and saw something in his face. "Ah, that's it."

"It's nothing."

"Well, it's none of my business. But I tell you what. You know that the first and third potions we do every week are on the OWL, right? But the second potion is always something easier. I set it that way to give everyone some breathing space. From now on, you're excused from any homework on the second potion of every week."

Seb hadn't been expecting this. He didn't know what to say.

Professor Sophos wasn't finished, though. Now she was peering over her glasses at him, and her gaze was suddenly icy. "In exchange... I want you to stop abusing Wideye potions. That's not good for you, not at all. It can have some serious side effects. If you need to stay awake a little longer, I suggest a cup of strong black tea."

Before Seb could even process what was going on, she continued even further. "I'll be speaking to Madame Pomfrey. You need to rest for a day or two, and if I can't trust you to stay in the dorms and sleep, or at least read something that isn't a textbook, I'll have her admit you to the hospital wing. You'll be getting a note soon. I'll take care of contacting your other professors. As far as they or anyone else are concerned, you've got the flu."

Seb realized his mouth was open. He shut it.

Professor Sophos got up and patted him on the shoulder. "A lot of our top students have problems like this. Don't worry about it. You're not the first, not even the first this year, and you won't be the last."

"How did you--" Seb managed. 

"I'm the head of Slytherin House for a reason, dear," she said, her voice softening again. "It's not easy to lie to me. I know my own."

And she walked out of the room, holding the door for him on her way out. Their visit was over.

Still reeling, Seb forgot all about tracking Hazelnut. He went down another flight of stairs, mindlessly, and almost stumbled back into the common room.

"What's up?" Julian asked. "You look terrible."

Seb decided this was a good time to start reinforcing his cover story. "I think I'm coming down with something. Maybe a cold. I'm gonna go lie down."

"Who are you and what have you done with the real Seb?" Julian asked. "Should I keep an eye on you for the next hour to see the Polyjuice potion wear off?"

"Go eat Flobberworms, I'm crashing."

"And I didn't even drug your pumpkin juice."


	6. Leisurely Heroics

The next day, Seb found a note from Madame Pomfrey on his nightstand, weighed down with a bottle of potion.

He unfolded the note. Inside were very clear instructions for him. There was a list of encouraged activities: he could sleep, read for pleasure, walk around the grounds, or play games that didn't disturb other students. There was also a list of forbidden activities: classwork, reading textbooks, using study sheets, doing potions work, practicing spells, or any other form of academic activity. It also said that the potion he'd been offered was a sleeping potion, and laid out very clearly that it was enchanted so that Madame Pomfrey would receive a report on who drank it, so no giving it to someone else for a prank.

It was the strangest note Seb had ever received from the school. He hadn't been aware that school-sanctioned mental health days were a thing.

In all honesty, Seb didn't really know what to do with himself. He looked over the note again--this time he understood why it included a list of things he was encouraged to do.

His thoughts were interrupted when he realized that his nightstand now also held a large plate full of all the things he liked most for breakfast. A house elf must have come and gone while he was distracted. 

He ate, read for a while, napped for a while, got up, and decided to go wandering. The sky was clear, with a gentle breeze that was just enough to keep the sunlight from feeling too warm. He strolled past the pumpkin patch, over the grounds, and around the lake. Nobody was really around at this time of day, except perhaps the gamekeeper. Seb examined the nearby trees, appraising them for climbability. He thought it might be nice to relax out of sight in the branches.

But before he could choose one, movement caught his eye. A streak of ginger fur flew past, followed by a creature with a strange, loping gait--although it was still moving quickly. Seb reached for his wand and lit up the tracking spell. He was very close.

He heard rustling. Hazelnut had just launched herself into a tree and started climbing. Agitated, the creature pursuing her paced quickly around the base of the tree, waiting for her to come down. Seb had thought at first that it was a dog, but as he ran closer he recognized it as a Nogtail, which explained the creepy way it moved. It looked like a scrawny pig on legs like stilts, with black eyes and deceptively sharp teeth. When available, they suckled milk from nursing pigs. If no pigs on a farm were nursing, it would readily accept their blood. If no pigs were around at all, Nogtails sometimes attacked other animals for food instead.

Nogtails might be aggressive, fast, and magic resistant... but they couldn't climb trees. Seb had time. He could run and try to find the Care of Magical Creatures teacher (this beast was almost certainly an escapee from his class), who would probably deal with the situation by picking up the Nogtail, giving it some baby talk, and carrying it back to its enclosure--which would be a clean way of dealing with this if he knew where the professor was. He couldn't just leave without knowing how quickly he could return.

Nogtails couldn't climb, right? They needed a running start to get any kind of height on a jump, and their spindly legs weren't built to grab onto footholds.

Seb had a plan. A stupid plan, but a plan nevertheless. He stopped running towards the Nogtail and the tree Hazelnut was hiding in.

"Defodio!" He cast the spell on the ground in front of him several times, creating a deep pit. Then he whistled and clapped his hands, trying to get the Nogtail's attention.

It didn't seem to hear him, but next time it paced back in his direction, it sniffed the wind. Then, slowly at first but gathering speed, it charged at him. Seb backed off. Now it was just a game of chicken.

The Nogtail jumped over the pit.

"Flipendo!" Seb shouted in panic.

This worked. Not only was the Nogtail knocked back, but it landed in the pit upside down. Whining and squealing, it righted itself as Seb peered over the edge of his pit.

He looked up, hearing rustling in the tree. He'd expected to see Hazelnut hopping down from branch to branch, but instead, a redhead girl in Hufflepuff robes was lowering herself carefully to the ground.

"...Thanks," she said.

"Uh," Seb said, "you're welcome?" He glanced up at the tree. No cat. "...Hazelnut?"

"Just Hazel," she said, brushing herself off. The way she parted her hair strongly resembled the markings on the cat's face, dividing the white nose from the ginger ears. "Um..."

"This is going to sound dumb," Seb said, "but are you my cat?"

Hazel transformed. She circled around his ankles, pausing to hiss at the Nogtail before looking back up at Seb. Then she stepped away and turned back into a girl.

"You're in fifth year," Seb said flatly. "You're an Animagus."

She nodded. Finally, she met his eyes. Hers were that same warm, nutty brown as the cat's. There wasn't any denying it.

"I had to," she said. "I used it to escape a... bad living situation. I'm sorry I, uh, didn't tell you earlier. You just... seemed like you needed a cat."

"...Yeah."

An awkward pause filled the air while the girl turned red.

"I did," Seb said.

"Um, I know... that hanging out with someone from Hufflepuff isn't exactly great for your social standing..."

Seb laughed. "You'd be hanging out with someone from Slytherin," he said. "I'd argue that's worse."

"I don't care."

"Thhhen," Seb said, hating the way his voice was shaking, "uh... there's a Hogsmeade trip coming up."

She looked a little surprised, as if not sure where this was going.

"You know an awful lot about me," Seb said--more than he'd really like anyone to know, he thought to himself-- "but I hardly know anything about you. I can't, uh, pretend to be an animal or anything? But maybe you'll talk to me anyway?"

She laughed. "Yes, I'll go on a date with you."

Seb felt his ears burning. "Um, I, uh... yes. That... that's what I wanted."

She hugged him. Seb hadn't been expecting this. She'd pinned his arms to his sides, so the best he could do was wrap his wrists around her feebly. She was, he thought, the most wholesome loose cannon he'd ever met--and, meanwhile, the list of people he couldn't effectively lie to was growing once again.

This time, Seb felt he didn't mind.


End file.
